Even non-specialists will notice that they bear little resemblance to testes

A set back for science:

We previously reported that two chocolates—Teasers and Truffles (Celebrations, Masterfoods UK, Melton Mowbray)—were strikingly similar to the 8 ml bead of the orchidometer used to assess testicular volume. We therefore suggested that they could be used to stage puberty in males and, because of their wide availability and low cost, commended their use. We were recently dismayed to discover that the manufacturer has changed the shape of both these chocolates.

More important research here.

Via Megan McArdle.

Update: This one debunking medical myths is actually useful.

We selected seven for critical review:

• People should drink at least eight glasses of water a day
  
• We use only 10% of our brains
  
• Hair and fingernails continue to grow after death
  
• Shaving hair causes it to grow back faster, darker, or coarser
  
• Reading in dim light ruins your eyesight
  
• Eating turkey makes people especially drowsy
  
• Mobile phones create considerable electromagnetic interference in hospitals.

Conclusions

Despite their popularity, all of these medical beliefs range from unproved to untrue. Although this was not a systematic review of either the breadth of medical myths or of all available evidence related to each myth, the search methods produced a large number of references. While some of these myths simply do not have evidence to confirm them, others have been studied and proved wrong.

There are about five people I owe a kick in the nuts to over the shaved hair thing. This one is so obviously wrong and so obvious why people wrongly believe it that I'm amazed people have been pigheaded enough to argue with me about it.

Like GWAR, but without the talent and social consciousness

Reading the comments to Hit & Run's best music of 2007 post, I stumbled across this gem. The track names have to be seen to be believed.

And, yes, it's actually available on iTunes. Do try some of the samples. If you can tell any of them apart or resist jabbing the sharp end of a pencil in both ears, you're a worse man than I.

It is a truth universally acknowledged that a man in possession of the single Wanna be a Baller

...must be in want of Still a Bitch (nsfw).




Seaton, it has been eight years. I hope at some point you realized there were other songs out there. Although I will admit that "boooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooook" is never going to stop being funny.

Addendum: Who knew that a Lil' Troy title reference predated the vast majority of my Old 97's dead horse beating?

Update: I am shocked as hell to discover my title formulation is the first such abuse google has witnessed. Is our nation's amateur and professional music critics learning lazy or did they just regard this as too obvious and twee?

Past in present

Feist is the new Jewel. Discuss.

Addendum: I also have cause to remember this evening that I have only deliberately and with malice aforethought attended perhaps nine live music performances where I knew who I was going to see. Six of these for some reason were Cowboy Mouth.

Yes, I got an iPod.

Furthermore: I've learned during my past couple of trips to Texas that Dallas has the worst group of radio stations in the state. The "mainstream" stations' play lists are solid b-sides from five years ago, and the weird ones are so out there that I actually heard an Old 97's song (Barrier Reef) on the radio for the first time. I haven't been so shocked since hearing Ocean City Girl on the muzak speakers outside a shopping center in Columbus, Georgia.

My name is Legion

An Economist blogger attended a lecture on "The Nature & Activity of Demons" at a Church where Huckabee gave a sermon last Sunday.

Christians should keep a sharp eye out for "Symptoms of the Demonized," and yes, a demonised person is someone who literally has an indwelling demon. These symptoms include:

• Bitter memories that will not go away even after forgiving
  
• Secret sin that you cannot conquer/compel
• No abundance of life or peace
• Will not submit to spiritual authority
• Bound in a souless relationship
• Health problems with or without a medical reason
• Dysfunctional family

And my favourite:

• Unreasonable anger or fear of a Pastor or a Spiritual Authority

I, of course, am pretty damned demon-ridden. I suspect, however, that one of my readers can come even closer to a clean sweep. I owe you a high five at our next Satanic briefing.

Hidden treasures

I'm back from a week+ in Texas, alone in my house for the next four days. I decided not to waste five days of leave on a weekend and the New Year's penumbra when we'd not have to do anything anyway. My roommates decided not to spend anymore time in Lawton than absolutely necessary. This is the difference between clever and wise.

Anyway, having completed four of my seven months in beautiful Lawton, Oklahoma, I decided today to make use of the opportunity to seriously abuse the common areas of our house by unpacking some of the ten or so boxes of crap I don't really need that were strewn around my room.

It was nice to unearth some of my favorite books that I can now properly put on a shelf and ignore until I repack everything in March. It was mildly embarrassing to discover that one of my mom's friends who I've met twice gave me a card and $100 check dated May 5, 2005 for my law school graduation. Since it was made out to "Dillon" and my stepfather's last name, I felt less bad about this than I might have.

The main impetus of my much delayed domicile deconstruction is the arrival of my new 42" plasma HDTV. It looks stupid enough in a bedroom without surrounding it with leaning boxes of crap. AWESOME stupid! I discovered an electronics store in Corpus Christi going out of business and offering a display unit as is for $799.

Having thought to carefully evaluate the picture quality and google user opinions two days after purchasing it without a warranty or option to return, I have belatedly discovered that with the rash of post-Christmas HDTVs marked down $200-300 from what they were a month ago, I could have gotten a significantly better TV for another $500 that I don't want to spend or the exact same TV from some dude on Craigslist St. Louis for an extra $80, a few hours travel, and several more moments of self doubt about whether I should have bought it at all.

This is the difference between lucky and wise.

Because the nerd is a tiresomely predictable creature to whom the promise of boobies is like a bacon sandwich to a starving wolf

Reasons to hate British men:

1. Hollywood tells me to.

2. One of them probably married Italian Girl.

3. This funny Mass Effect review.

He's dead on about Halo 3, however.

Pride of Pennsylvania

Damn you, Brian. Now I know how you felt in law school when I sent you all those crazy PA news stories.

During my third annual visit to Drudge I saw a headline about 235 dogs being seized from a "Texas" home. Remembering in horror the craziness of four mini-daschunds at my mom's house over Thanksgiving (two were visiting), I had to follow the link.

Can you imagine hundreds of dogs living under one roof?

That's exactly what was happening in a house just off of Ocean Drive near Ennis Joslin.

I sprayed water on my desk. That's maybe half a mile from the house I grew up in. It's probably within a couple of blocks of one of my best friends in high school. And as a bonus, the video features Joe Gazin.

I think I once wrote a post about my small claims court mediation experience with specific reference to how common and sadly amusing in rem precedings against such parties as "11 dogs, 3 cats, 2 goats and a horse" are, but it's unfortunately lost with all the rest of the old blog.

Speaking of goats, for some reason our very slow 2.6 mile brigade run on Friday was led by a colonel, a fat pony, and a fat goat. The goat, at least, fell out and ate my dust. The colonel had the day before been cut off by and made to eat the dust of a classmate enjoying his new BMW.

The pony? I'd follow him anywhere.

Aim Wide

I once thought Army jokes about the Air Force were greatly exaggerated and somewhat unfair. Then we had our close air support (CAS) class last week and met the fattest officer in the armed forces. He looked like the brother of that mind reader guy on Heroes.

I've gained more weight than I'd like since getting out of the controlled training environment of BCT and OCS, so I can sympathize, but come on. Today we had a simulator exercise today with the same guy and one of his colleagues who was almost as big. Maybe it's depression eating from being grounded for two years while they teach here.

My simulator guy was the Technical Sergeant who spent the last couple of years attached to an infantry unit and last week looked impressive and in shape in his BDU's with Airborne and Air Assault badges. Today he showed up in jeans, a sweatshirt, and some biker boots with an improbable amount of metal attached.

I.V. Freely

I'm something of a fan of psychological numerology - go read Foucalt's Pendulum for one theory of why 3 and 7 are "magic" numbers across cultures (biology) and The Chronoliths for another (non-mid or endpoints seem more "random" and special).

So it's been aggravating the shit out of me to notice, while rereading some sci-fi favorites, the tendency among genre authors to name planets by the convention of (system star same) IV. Richard K. Morgan has Sanction IV in Broken Angels; Bujold has no less than four planets following this nomenclature (Minos IV, Eta Ceta IV, and a couple of others I noted but apparently blocked out in fury since then) in her Vorkosigan books.

I hate to drag these people back down to Sol III, but if one is going to follow a lazy naming convention please avoid cliche. It is unlikely that every inhabitable planet but this one is the fourth in distance from its sun. And, really, Roman numerals in general and those of the IV, IX and CM variations in particular, are not cool.

Incidentally, rereading the Vorkosigan books I'm once again puzzled by why Amber doesn't like them very much. The central lesson, based on when the Cordelia and Miles story arcs end is that your life comes to a crashing halt when you have children and nothing interesting ever happens again. I'd think she'd be pleased to have someone agree with her. She, on the other hand, should stop writing boring fantasy (and more recently fantasy porn) and learn to love protagonists with off screen children.

And the number 3.

Sounds of the season

I have three times this week randomly tuned into the final twenty seconds of Dan Fogelberg's Same Old Lang Syne. Some of you will be fortunate enough not to have previously understood how painful this was. Rumors that I used to own it are a vile calumny.

I have also discovered a link where you can listen to the Mass Effect credits music if you like that sort of thing. I was surprised to find that I did. What M4 is and whether I should care about Part I, however, will remain a mystery.

It appears the composer of the best video game song of all time is releasing an album, so maybe I can finally buy the fucking thing on iTunes one of these days. Until then, you can stream Baba Yetu at his webpage.